Japanese Type 1 (Type 98/MG-15 clone) reactivated

[sbl11]

Would love to see it! price is all in condition. If it is a registered Dewatt, then why not make it a live gun?

-Seth

[DDayDog]

Would love to see it! price is all in condition. If it is a registered Dewatt, then why not make it a live gun? -Seth

That was one thought, but if the weld in the chamber somehow boogered it up, I'm not sure I'd want to spend the dough to get it to that point. And I'm saving up for another expensive project gun being made in Texas. I'll get some pics of the MG15 and post them here.

Doug

[IMBLITZVT]

Would love to see it! price is all in condition. If it is a registered Dewatt, then why not make it a live gun? -Seth

That was one thought, but if the weld in the chamber somehow boogered it up, I'm not sure I'd want to spend the dough to get it to that point. And I'm saving up for another expensive project gun being made in Texas. I'll get some pics of the MG15 and post them here.

Doug

Doug, I don't understand where you are coming from. If its a REGISTERED Dewat, PLEASE under no condition cut it for a parts kit. I or Seth will buy it for 2x parts kit prices NO matter how bad the dewat is! If its registered. Please send me pictures! phiteshe@vt.edu and what price are we talking?

[TactAdv]

"If its a REGISTERED Dewat....."

And.....I think you're missing the subtle point there. ;-) ;-)

[sbl11]

haha...parts are interchangeable with those easily bought from ima. Yea, if it is regiestered, then I would be an interested buyer and will pay $500 over what Matt offers!..hahahaha


-Seth

[IMBLITZVT]

haha...parts are interchangeable with those easily bought from ima. Yea, if it is regiestered, then I would be an interested buyer and will pay $500 over what Matt offers!..hahahaha

Well good then I can offer a very lot and split the profit with the seller!

"If its a REGISTERED Dewat....."

And.....I think you're missing the subtle point there. ;-) ;-)

No I did not miss the point. However if thats the case no one in their right mind would be selling it as anything other than a parts kit... I have seen odder things than taking this at face value...

[bmg17a1]

These shark infested posts are not being of much help here. 8^)
There is a possibility that the gun is registered and it would be wise to do a bit of a search to find out if it is. Although it is unlikely that it is and that various hurdles can be cleared, the gun has value from $5-8000. If it turns out that the serial number is in the registry, then it becomes necessary to find out under what name it is registered. While it is fairly easy to find out if it is registered, determining the name of the registrant is extremely difficult as the information is confidential to ATF and can only be revealed by them under very restrictive circumstances.
Usually the person with such MGS is not the registrant and has no knowledge of who might be. This person is also in possession of an MG not registered to them, along with a second liability that the gun might not be registered, so there is serious legal liability involved. Be smart and keep the gun out of sight and do not talk about it locally.

If you are interested in other options for handling this weapon, or researching if the serial is in the registry call me at 802-226-7204. I have assisted with many, many such MGs and have a number of successes to date.

Bob Naess
Black River Militaria CII

[sbl11]

feeding frenzy!!!! haha Matt, maybe it is that we are both on the same team driving the price down to a very low level so that it appears as if the $500 is a good boost!...haha just kidding Doug.

I need not know anything other than the guns features for my researching purposes.

-Seth

[IMBLITZVT]

feeding frenzy!!!! haha Matt, maybe it is that we are both on the same team driving the price down to a very low level so that it appears as if the $500 is a good boost!...haha just kidding Doug...

Yeah I was really just trying to make sure someone was not cutting up a good dewat because they thought no one would want it because of the level of the dewat. Of course I would love a very well priced MG but that was really not the point of my post.

[DDayDog]

Yes - the big question being IF it is registered. Bob, I was told by Seth that you're a great guy and might be able to help me out, if needed, to determine registry. When I made the first post, I had been told it was a dewat and assume my friend knew exactly what that meant. But now, just a few moments ago, I spoke with him again and he is 100% confident that the receiver is untouched. Some confirmation on the history - the current owner got it from a woman whose husband took it as a war trophy off of Attu Is. here in Alaska. The husband died and the woman gave it to the man because she did not want it. The current owner has NO paperwork on it, but for some internet research - which doesn't do any good. So... unless the guy who took it as a war trophy got it registered before the amnesty, this is NOT a papered gun and is a hot potato. He may have, but I have no idea on that. If it's a registered gun, I would imagine it to be still in the initial guy's name and NO transfer to the wife. I would definitely need help to determine that before I shell out the coin to pay for it. If it's a registered gun, I'd be interested in buying it and making it into a live firing weapon - through the proper persons and depending on costs. If he's wrong and it's cut somewhere that he doesn't know where to look, I would (depending on price) buy it and sell it as a parts kit. Hope this clears any confusion. If anyone wants to chat with me about it, feel free to call. 907-441-5785. Thanks for the imput guys !!!

Doug

[sbl11]

Looking into the production of the (E)Naval type 1 guns, I recently saw the parts kit gun for sale on Gun Broker that had a very odd style of marking not seen on any other gun. It appears as if it was not gouged with and electro-pencil, but instead stamped with what seems to be a blade (done very similar in style to a signed sword blade). Yet, the gun still fell in line with those guns that seem be a simple version of the yokosuka arsenal guns lacking the fore-grip. Serial numbers suggest that of all type 1's marked with the "E" for yokosuka naval arsenal the simplification occurred around 1700 out of roughly 4000 total, before the in late 1944 when production of these simplistic designs was turned over to the new arsenal believed to be the remnants of the aircraft machinegun production line of Nagoya Arsenal.



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[bmg17a1]

Customer has Jap T1 offered with watercooled kit and extras. Price is unrealistic, meaning way too high, but can be negotiated possibly.
Contact me off site if interested.

Bob Naess

[TactAdv]

Seth- that is a weird stamping there......might just go to show how far gone was their industrial capacity by that point. Also, perhaps if they did switch to another production line for the Navy guns at that point it may be be that there did not exist at that location yet a suitable set of proper engraving dies for a period of time necessitating the "hand stamping" seen here. Would be curious to see if a higher serial number produced a return to the "normal" T1 markings baseline, suggesting that this was a short-lived protocol??

The only other thing I can suggest is that this particular receiver may have been a re-constituted piece that was later salvaged somehow and returned to the acceptable pile and subsequently built up and delivered.....necessitating the hand-stamping seen on it? My last thought might be the reverse of that in that this was possibly some kind of "replacement" receiver that was used to complete a defective one after the fact and later hand-stamped??

Now then......from the second picture....I am going out on a limb to suggest that that saw-cut receiver there was completely intact up until VERY recently, Eh?? ;-)

Lost of stuff falling out the woodwork, more and more......

-TomH

[sbl11]

Beats me on where this came from, or as to who owns it.

I can answer the point you make about returning to the standard marking style....it is YES. Seems as if it only lasted for a short production run. Maybe the engraver got sick for a week!!!

-Seth

[sbl11]

http://www.cowanauctions.com/auctions/i ... mId=122436



Check out the tripod! Be neat to see it in person!

Very similar to this one!





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[bmg17a1]

The tripod on Dick Wrays Jap Lewis is one convertered from some other use, not necesarily for an MG, and fitted with a home made pintle. Quite a few of Dick's guns had homemade or altered mounts or mouts adapted from other MGs.
Having been to his bowling alley and seen his guns many times, there were a lot of things constructed in his shop by him, his machinist and a couple of other guys over the years. All the Vickers guns are sideplate remans, as are the M36 Swedish twin Brownings, the Swiss Maxim, the MG13, etc, etc. The other belt guns, Bergman, ,Darne, etc though are all real.

Bob Naess

[sbl11]

The description of that tripod says that it has Japanese markings. It looks to be larger, however, than those pictured used with the type 98, and type 1 on this thread.

-seth

[bmg17a1]

The tripod on that Jap Aircraft Lewis looks different than the one that I recall, after looking at it again in the pics on the auction site. Seems to me that one time, at his bowling alley/ machine shop the gun was on a Swiss LMG tripod, and then later on that one or so,meshing similar. Have pics of it somewhere so maybe I can find them and get a better idea. At any rate, use of such a tripod would have been as a field expedient, in my opinion.
Various guns in the auction have been placed on mounts that they were not on in his shop so stuff hash Ben changed around.
If anyone comes across a tripod for the Jap TII as used on the motorcycles, I would love to have one. I did manage to acquire a motorcycle bipod for the Russian DP28 which has a triangulating third leg that extends back from the a crosspiece between the legs and attaches to the front of the trigger guard by a screw clamp to stabilise the bipod on the deck of the sidecar. There are some pics no this set up.

Bob Naess

[sbl11]

An interesting turn of events occurred today thanks to Flickr's "Pacific Kilroy"

The above photograph pictures my type 98's original owner just a few days prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor. He is 15th from the left on the second row from the bottom. (to the left of the short guy)


Could he be this guy:




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Talked with his daughter and she can not positively identify the man in the nose of the crashed Japanese plane, for obvious reason, but the uniform, and features that do appear seem fairly close. More oddly, however, she remembers the gun from her childhood, and believes that the plane looks familiar and may be pictured twice in her father's photo album.

Fingers crossed!!

-Seth

[anjongni]

http://www.gunbroker.com/Auction/ViewIt ... =346619141]

This is a great topic. Here (from G/B) is a very original-looking MG15 air-cooled aircraft weapon with a commercial ST-61 Borsig receiver stamped "1942". Wouldn't it be unusual for commercial guns to get production-line space during wartime? Has this receiver been swapped-out? Were the aircraft guns made for foreign customers, like the water-cooled MG15s, or the Portuguese MG34s?...Phil